Belle Corp., which owns half of City of Dreams Manila (CoDM), has had a rough couple of years. Things went well in 2018, when it posted a year-on-year revenue increase of $69 million, but that was the height of the gains. Last year, it saw its consolidated net income fall 11% in the first half of the year, and 2020 has hit it even harder. According to its latest filing, Belle Corp., suffering from the casino shutdown in the Philippines, reported a 96% drop in income for the first nine months of the year.

From January to September, Belle Corp. had income of just $1.92 million, down from $52.8 million during the same period in 2019. The Philippines, like virtually everywhere else around the world, was forced to shut down its gambling and other commercial operations because of COVID-19, leading to the company seeing revenue of just $60.06 million compared to the $119.09 million it recorded during the first nine months of last year.

From July to September, the company took a net loss of $2.66 million after having gains of $10.64 million during the same period in 2019. That quarter’s bottom line came off of revenue that had fallen 42%, dropping to $18.69 million from $32.43 million a year earlier. The majority of the losses are directly attributed to the shutdown of CoDM, which caused the company to lose 86% of its revenue from the venue over the first nine months of 2020. It only received $6.717 million during the period, whereas it had been able to rake in $49.19 million for the period last year.

COVID-19 forced the Philippines to either shut down completely or severely handicap casinos from the middle of March until September. Losing a primary revenue stream for six months is enough to hurt any company, and Belle Corp. added in its filing, “The decreases in revenues and profits resulted primarily from Covid-19 related developments. The effects of the pandemic began with declining tourist arrivals prior to the implementation of the community quarantines nationwide and [were] compounded by the temporary suspension of gaming operations at City of Dreams Manila on March 16, 2020 in compliance with government initiatives to contain the virus.”